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I’ve got the ESP8266 (ESP-03) wired up and semi-working. I’ve read in many blog posts that this package can take quite a bit of current to power so I’m assuming that’s why I can’t get it to connect to an AP. I ordered a 5v/3.3v breadboard power supply and once that arrives I’ll try testing again. Right now it’s connected to an Arduino UNO R3 using the software UART. Luckily I didn’t have to flash any newer firmware to achieve the lower baud rate needed.

In the image below you’ll see I just used the same wires that I made in an earlier post to solder onto the ESP8266. This allowed me to easily connect it to a breadboard for testing. Ideally for prototyping I’d like to get an adapter board like the one made byElectroDragon. The end result of any project would probably be to surface mount solder the ESP8266 to another PCB like the Baoshi designed breakout board.

I’m very excited to try out this new chip. This is the EspressifESP8266. A super cheap (approx. $3-4 CDN) and very small SOC with built in WiFi. It’s somewhat similar to the Spark Core that I already have, though not quite as refined and minus the cloud access. The ESP8266 was released early 2014 but didn’t really show up on my radar till about August 2014. I dismissed it initially as there was very little documentation out on the internet. But then I checked up on it again in December and I was amazed by the ever growing number of follower. New documentation was created, existing stuff had been translated (mostly) and there were plenty of project already in the works. I decided to buy three of these on eBay from user “czb6721960“.

Yesterday as I was connecting some things up on my Sparkfun Redboard (Arduino copy) and I ran out of breadboarding wires. I decided that I must have something around that I could use as a quick substitution. What better than some solid core cat5 cable. Once stripped down I could cut it exactly to length and it seemed to fit the breadboard perfectly. Take a look for your self in the pictures below.